How long will it be? (Revelation 6:10)

by David Neuhaus SJ

This morning, an Israeli military attack killed three people: Saad Issa Constandi Salameh, Najwa Abu Daoud and Phemia Ayyad. It wounded several others, including the parish priest, Father Gabriel Romanelli, in the Holy Family Roman Catholic Church in Gaza. The church and its parish compound have served as a refuge for hundreds of people since the beginning of Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, which began on October 7, 2023. This is not the first time that the Roman Catholic church and the neighbouring Greek Orthodox church have been attacked, and people have been killed on their premises. 

Israel’s claim over the past twenty months of military assault on Gaza and its residents is that it is fighting a war against Hamas, after members of the Islamic armed group, together with members of other armed groups and individuals, surged into Israel, killing 815 civilians and 379 Israeli military personnel and taking about 250 people hostage. Since the beginning of the Israeli assault, over 58 000 Gazans have been killed by direct Israeli military attacks not counting those dying daily as a result of the war because they are unable to receive medical assistance and from malnutrition as the Israeli army limits humanitarian aid and the little that is distributed is used as an instrument to control and punish the civilian population. Ninety-two per cent of the Gaza Strip is in ruins. Civilian institutions, schools, hospitals, and social welfare structures have all collapsed, leaving a civilian population without any means to confront the brutality of the ongoing assault, defined by many as an ongoing genocide. In recent weeks, tens of people have been gunned down daily, many of them at so-called “aid distribution sites”.

Israeli brutality has intensified during this war in the West Bank, too. More than 70,000 people have been made homeless as refugee camps in Jenin and Tulkarm have been flattened. Militant Israeli settlers have been regularly going on the rampage in Palestinian towns and villages, defended by the Israeli army. Furthermore, the Israeli military bombards surrounding countries too – Lebanon, Syria, Yemen. The claim is always the same: “We are threatened by armed Islamic groups”. The consequences are always the same too: the Israeli military kills men, women and children – a few militants and many civilians, mostly women and children – all considered collateral damage.

Most of what is happening is ignored by world leaders. Few are willing to challenge Israel. President Trump and his team have made it clear that their support for the Israeli regime is absolute and unconditional. Furthermore, individuals and agencies that do stand up against Israel’s brutality are subject to harassment and even prosecution by the US administration. Most world leaders are studiously ignoring the mass demonstrations that call for the killing to end, for the genocide to stop! 

However, sometimes, the victims of the Israelis are Palestinians who happen to be Christians. Then, suddenly, the leaders seem to awaken for a few moments to the horrors of what is happening to the Palestinians as a whole. It is almost as if when the victims are Muslims, whether they are men or women, young or old, healthy or infirm, they are suspect. Surely, they could be the militants Israel claims to be fighting. When they are Christians, the Israeli killing machine is called to some minimal account. However, each time Christians have been killed by Israeli military assault, the response has been the same. Today, too, an army spokesman responded that Israel “expresses deep sorrow over the damage to the Holy Family Church in Gaza City and over any civilian casualty. The IDF is examining this incident, the circumstances of which are still unclear, and the results of the investigation will be published transparently. Israel never targets churches or religious sites and regrets any harm to a religious site or to uninvolved civilians.” 

On October 19, 2023, an attack on Saint Porphyr Orthodox Church in Gaza left 18 dead and many injured. On December 16, 2023, two women were shot dead and others wounded by a sniper in the courtyard of the Holy Family Roman Catholic Church. Both churches have been targeted at other times, causing grievous damage to church property. Each time, similar Israeli statements were made. Never has there been any follow-up. Mosques are obviously not intended in the Israeli statement about religious sites, as over one thousand have been deliberately destroyed throughout the Gaza Strip since October 2023. 

Christian deaths seem to interest the powerful more than Muslim deaths. How many Christians must still die before the international community decides that the time has come to rein in Israeli brutality against the Palestinian people? And when will human lives count for enough to bring this genocide to an end?